rapturerebornmmorpgfandomcom-20200216-history
Era Electronics
Sitemap Era Electronics * See Also Bio-Electronics * See Also The_Thinker * See Also Rapture_Computers * See also Era_Computers --- --- --- --- --- Selectron -- A Selective Electrostatic Storage Tube : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selectron_tube http://rcaselectron.com/ A method of using a Cathode Tube's Phosphorescence effect in a computer 'memory' device back when only big companies/governments could afford their own computers (which were still using Vacuum Tubes). Middle 40s technology (Late 40s when actually used) Of course the Selectron tubes were just a small part of the memory mechanism (there was all the electronics needed to drive all the address lines and to control/amplify the data signals coming/going from the tubes). The brilliance of Rapture's engineers utilizing these may have been more successful than the companies on The Surface (and improved memory Tubes may have been what makes up those computer racks we see up on the walls (the ones that are a grid of tubes in so many places in Minervas Den). These would have been superseded by the Bio-Electronics in the middle 50s in Rapture (an improvement step needed to make The Thinker possible). --- --- --- Early Memrister Technology ? ''' : A Substance that by application of electricity is physically changed (Written), and that state can be detected independently in a 'READ' operation (it acts as a resistor or as a conductor), and on applying (WRITE) a higher voltage (forward/reversed current) changes its properties - to be one or the other conducting behavior to set its 'bit' to '1' or '0'.) The state remains/persists even when the power is turned off. Potentially a simpler circuit than core memories, and potentially smaller as it can employ a material plating at the intersection of two signal wires (you would have a 2D array of such wires to form a non-volatile computer memory component). Such substances are thought to have been first found in 1808. "Write" speed (of altering the substance), and the stability and repeatability of the operation typically would be its limitations. Those would have to be improved in Rapture - since this isn't "wave-the-hand" Infinite BS fantasy. Having some of these technologies prove to be too-difficult/too-expensive/impractical would be part of the game's story -- they really only get mentioned as part of the background story. In Rapture there was potential to use this component for artificial 'Neurons', but fabrication issues would not produce sufficient miniaturization (data densities) for useful '''NN (neural net) applications (and was superseded by ADAM-based organic circuits, which used natural self-organization to build the required logic function). This might be potentially-useful as Electrically Alterable ROM memory when the Bio-Electronic memory first worked better as statically written ROM (unchangeable data). --- --- --- Relative Memory Speeds : Typical Magnetic Core data access time (Real World) is 9 microseconds, which is at least 72 times slower than your PC's main memory today (versus vacuum tube access time being approximately 25 microseconds). If every instruction was a Data-fetch then that's about 110000 fetches per second (calculation instructions take even longer). The Bio-Electronic memory would not be faster than this. So for The Thinker, doing alot of stuff in parallel would be needed just to do its intelligence mimicry). --- --- --- Computer Tubes By the Thousands (Why Rapture Wouldn't Have Many Early Computers) : They fail and need to be replaced. The type of tubes used aren't a simple product, and they need to be mass-produced for the numbers required. Expensive to make locally (and the 1952 cutoff of the Surface eliminates outside sources). Large computers bigger than accounting/billing systems have limited utility, so it is hard for them TO PAY FOR their existence in Rapture. McClendon was looking at Transistors (invented 1949) to find better alternatives and eventually turned to Bio-Electronics. - Those Old Tube Testing Machines (MMORPG Prop) : Tube Test MAchine Pix All those TVs and radios, record players etc.. Many in Rapture would use tubes. Tubes burnout/fail and you have to test and replace them. Self-serve mechanisms allowed people to "do it themselves" (standard tubes made it fairly simple). There should be many of these somewhere in Rapture AND manufacture/re-manufacture of replacements (for all the many thousands of tube based appliances used in Rapture). --- --- --- Micro Vacuum Tubes in 1947 ''': pix Made wrist 2-way radios work (except the batteries ran out too fast) with very small 1/2 inch long tubes (with plated anode/cathode/grid instead of wires). In Rapture with local repeaters (Access Points/Hotspots in the parlance of our times) everywhere, the radios didn't need to be overly powerful). Compared to the huge vacuum tubes we saw in Minervas Den (200+ times the volume) there might have been some miniturization possible for early Rapture logic circuits using those -- again for NEW systems, when additional uses for computers were created (like more scientific/engineering number crunching). For a while, in the Real World, the new transistors were so expensive that vacuum tubes were still a viable option (the same would be true in Rapture). --- --- --- '''First Silicon Transistors 1954 (Real World) : Transistor Invented in 1947. It took several years to further design ones that worked reliably (and THAT'S with Large Military Expeditures paying very high prices to offset the R&D). Such Transistors would have to be bought and brought in from outside Rapture. These components were still quite large. Tubes would still be in use for most consumer goods (they were still cheaper than their Transistor equivalents). The First Consumer Transistor radio in the Surface word was made 1954 (Germanium type detector transistors) costing $50 which is about $450 today. Conventional Transistors would be used (in Raptureland) to amplify data/control signals to traverse wiring across a computer rack, and the lesser amplification for inter-module connections. Bio-Electronic amplifiers are used at pinout points on the Bio-electronic substrates to initially boost the internal working (micro) currents, and to simplify the external circuitry. An issue for Transistor Electronics use in Rapture is : Its not so much Recreating current technologies from the 'Surface' world (which could be expensively done in a conventional development laboratory), but creating a Process which could produce the components *cheap* enough for consumer use (and preferably cheaper and smaller than those contemporary Transistors). The first commercially produced transistors cost $100-$50 each (in 1950s dollars), and were mostly bought for Military and Space project use (where compactness justified their expense). Later advancements allowed mass production and use in consumer goods like the 'Transistor Radios'. Computer use was more specialized, and required hundreds/thousands of transistors (even when not used for Main Memory, which takes magnitudes larger quantities of transistors). --- --- --- Tinkertoy1.jpg Tinkertoy2.jpg Tinkertoy3.jpg Modularelectronic.jpg Project Tinkertoy mechanism 1953. Sonar Buoy using 'integrated' component modules. Technology was used for some consumer electronics after that time. Stacked components printed onto small PC board interconnected on their edges. The top thingee is where a tube plugged in (transistors were very expensive in the early days, costing around $50 each) so Vacuum Tubes were still used for a long time. Some consumer projects (radios, etc..) used modules like these for fairly standard circuit configurations (like amplifiers or voltage regulators). --- --- --- Modular electronics used in late 50s/very early 60s before Integrated Circuits were created/produced. Largely for military usage, where environmental stability requirements were much higher and conventional components had alot of trouble. It offered more dense packing than discrete components (the picture shows a stack of about 10 components into that small volume - all already interconnected within the package). This method had miniature PC boards wired together on their edges, and each board had at most only one or two components (resistors/capacitors/transistors/inductors) to build up commonly repeated circuitry. These were then put into a hermetically sealed case. The component boards could be mass produced and tested, versus most electronics which were still largely hand-assembled at that time. --- --- --- Patent for a particular construction way to build Point Contact Transistors (the early type). Transistors were invented in 1947. The world's first commercial transistor production line was in 1951. --- --- --- Cathode Ray Tube Display (sweep signal indicator) --- --- --- Those old mainframes had LOTS of Tubes Every "BIT" of memory typically required at least one Tube (and then the ones to run all those tubes ... --- --- --- Infrared Goggles existed before the end of WW2 --- --- --- GERMAN TV camera used at 1936 Olympics in Germany (one of 4). Used closed circuit (wires for its transmission to several viewing venues set up around Berlin. --- --- --- Commercial radio 1921 ( 2 decades before Rapture, 1 AFTER Columbia ). The Rapture Entrepreneurs would be well versed in the Technology, and for Columbia it would have to be one more Wave of the hand things that game was so full of (Full Of it ... BS). --- --- --- Tiny Vacuum Tube (note the metal case) used for Proximity Fuses during WW2 (artillery shells). --- --- --- Early experimentation with Transistors. Methods (materials, assembly process, containment) had to be found/developed to mass-produce Transistors and make them rugged/reliable/cheap enough to use in the Real World. Military use was the biggest customer - military electronics needed to be smaller, and smallest workable tubes where still too large and used too much power (and WERE used until Transistors came along). --- --- --- Nixie Tube Displays (DIGITAL !!) : http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=nixie+tube%7Clinky Non-digital, but the electronics which had to drive them WAS 'DIGITAL'. Based on a neon glow effect and contemporary tube technologies, with 'cold cathode' (unlike electronic vacuum tubes). 1955 - developed in Real World and used for decades til LEDs took over. They (in Rapture) could be fabricated from 'Surface' descriptions (tech info was one of the things smuggled into Rapture if not one of the officially sanctioned/authorized 'continued imports') (or obtained via 'authorized' purchased for 'important' projects). A specialized manufacture in Rapture (with Premium Prices ...) A standard MMOORPG Nixie Tube 'template' could be provided with the game Tools to incorporate as working Numeric Display into interactive Objects, and also as a (nostalgic) 'widget' for the Tablet/Smartphone interfaces which look sufficiently 'Retro' (intended for little difficulty to add for the person creating the 'App'). . . . --- --- --- --- --- . .